A Blind Man and his Monkey

By R D Roldan

Summary: In Medellin, Colombia, during the time of

Pablo Escobar, 15-year old Joe Cardenas is forced to deal

with the sudden suicide of his best friend, Alex Cuevas.

An early morning call in December of 1981, sets Joe off

on a quest to understand what led Alex to take his life.

Summary: In Medellin, Colombia, during

• Language: English
• Publisher: Roman D Roldan
• Release date: May 1, 2019
• ISBN: 9780578462790

Book preview

Chapter One

It has been one year, two months, and seventeen days since your funeral and I still have dreams about you almost every night. The dreams always start the same way: A rainy Saturday morning in early December of the year 1981. Five boys spread out throughout a small sacristy, two sitting on a couch, two leaning against a kitchen countertop, and me, sitting on the floor by a rusty filing cabinet in a corner of the room, my forehead resting on my knees. All five of us weeping loudly.

You were exactly five weeks shy of your fifteenth birthday when you killed yourself, I was almost sixteen, and you were my closest friend and roommate.

I have tried hard to repress the events that led to your death, but my memories have a life of their own and make themselves seen and heard at some of the most inopportune moments. I still see you in all our favorite places and I talk to you in my mind all the time. When I forget you are dead, I become very sad and angry that you don’t answer my questions or join me in my rants. Our conversations have become one-sided, internalized, and void of any real meaning. I miss hearing your voice, laughing at your silly humor, and listening to your colorful commentary about politics, religion, and the painful events unfolding in our fair city and country these last few years.

I have refused to accept any roommates since your death and the staff has made allowances for me because they know how much I still miss you. I look at your bed every morning and remember how you used to talk in your sleep, often disclosing secrets you never meant to tell anyone. I miss seeing how confused you got when I asked questions related to those confessions.

Hey, Alex, how is your dad’s broken arm healing? I would ask.

Confused, you would say, How in the hell did you know about my dad’s horse-riding accident?

By the time you killed yourself you had unknowingly disclosed that your cook had a child confined to a mental institution, two of your teachers were having an affair, your parents were having countless arguments about his workaholism or her friends, and your family’s driver may have been connected to the Medellin Cartel. Of course, to be fair, you never spoke in full sentences and I had to guess the rest of the story, but my guesses were always right to your annoyance.

I have been meeting regularly with Fr. Garcia and he believes I need to keep a journal of my feelings and grief. He fears I am becoming more depressed with time and he may be right. I have become a stranger to my family who can barely get a word out of me anymore. When I am home, I am usually hiding under a book on the terrace, sleeping, studying, or quietly eating my meals. Even my brother, Juan, who used to make me laugh as much as you did, has been unable to comfort me, and this is driving him crazy. I feel guilty about this and I fake a quick laugh at his jokes from time to time, but I haven’t had a good laugh since our last weekend at The Oaks. My mother believes you took my spirit with you when you died and I silently agree with her, but I don’t ever say it.

I have become so introspected and somber that I feel like a silent spectator in my own life. I still feel guilty that, somehow, I missed the opportunity to help you and I am so angry at you and the whole world that I feel completely void of any love and compassion for anyone. My role in the events that took place after your funeral brings me some comfort, but it is always an ephemeral feeling that doesn’t last, like the sudden smoke of a snuffed candle.

The other day, I was riding a bus from Bello to Medellin’s center, when a phrase, long forgotten, came to my mind,

In this family we deny, repress, and move on.

I broke into a sad quick laugh, followed by quiet tears I tried hard to hide from other passengers. Some memories have the power to change our moods and transport us to places and times we would rather forget. I suppose the opposite is also true, some memories lift us back to places and times when we have experienced indescribable joy and peace. The memories of our brief friendship, when we were young and naïve, bring me joy and deep pain at the same time. Some may argue that I am still very young at seventeen, but I feel very old and jaded. I have some of the despicable characters I met after your funeral to thank for the loss of innocence I have gone through.

In this family, we eat our young with pride and chase them with a cup of black coffee.   

Several weeks ago, I agreed to write your story, not just because it is good therapy, as Fr. Garcia calls it, but also because I don’t want to ever forget you. This process has opened wounds that remain raw, and my mind has had to face for a second time some of the worst people I have ever met. I do hope that when I am done telling this dark and painful tale, I will feel some peace of mind. I am searching for light at the end of a very dark tunnel and I am tired of feeling empty, useless, and angry.

My recurrent dream was a good place to start the story. Five boys spread out in a small sacristy, adjacent to a large and modern church in Envigado, Colombia. As I started writing, I focused on each of those boy’s faces as a photographer maneuvering his camera to bring his subject into clear focus. But no amount of zooming in helped me recognize any of their faces. I had only met them briefly the night before at your wake, and I could barely recall their names.

Do you remember watching Sesame Street when we were growing up? I used to like those episodes where the commentator compared four items, three of which belonged to a set or pattern and one which obviously did not. I still remember the catchy songs, One of these things is not like the others. Which one is different? Do you know? Can you tell which thing is not like the others? I tell you if it is so. I felt just like the thing that didn’t belong. The scene in the dream was foreign to me. These people were not my friends and I had little in common with them. Yet, I was there.

I met these four boys the night before at your wake at an upscale funeral home in your hometown. I had lived in Medellin for six years by then, but I had never been to Envigado. In fact, I got lost several times trying to get there. I still managed to arrive almost an hour early. It had taken me almost two hours to get there, but, nothing short of death or dismemberment would have prevented me from attending your wake.

I had met your mother briefly about six months before. When I arrived, the family and a small army of volunteers were setting up the hall, arranging chairs and couches for the visitation, making coffee in the parlor’s modern kitchen, and setting up trays of sandwiches. Your mother recognized me as soon as I walked through the door. She looked frail and exhausted. It was obvious that she was upset. How could she not be upset? You were only fourteen years old and you were her only son. I cannot imagine the pain of losing a child at so young an age, especially the way you died. She must have been consumed with grief, guilt, and regrets.

Your mother ran to me and gave me an uncomfortable hug. I tried hard not to smile, when the hug reminded me of our first meeting almost a year before. It seemed like time had gone by so fast. One moment we are two young teens trying to discover our place in the world, and the next day, I am at your wake, trying to deal with the debris of the dangerous hurricane you left behind. I recognized in your mother that which I had seen in myself as I entered the hall and passed a set of ornate mirrors hanging at the entrance hall. The combination of hours of crying, little food, and no sleep made her look ancient and sickly. The same combination of factors made me look emaciated and pathetically small.

Still hugging me, your mother whispered in my ear, If I forget to say it later, please know that I am grateful for your friendship to Alex. It meant a lot to him. He talked about you often.

She started crying softly once again. Her tears falling on my back, while mine were falling freely on the front of my shirt. I remained still, not knowing what to say. Back then, I tended to be very uncomfortable in most social situations, especially in conversations with adults. Ironically, I was a well-known public speaker in our circles, but, when it came to one-to-one encounters, I always felt anxious and insecure. It was as though my brain refused to work properly when the person in front of me was older than 15. Adding to the discomfort was the fact that I came from a family who never hugged or kissed, and who felt uncomfortable showing emotions in public.

After the interminable hug, your mother accepted my offer to help in the setting up of the parlor. My job was to go through a box of framed photographs and to choose six or seven pictures that could be displayed on a table near the front entrance of the funeral home, right underneath the wall of mirrors. The funeral director was a wiry, anxious, eager-to-please, little man, wearing John Lennon glasses. He still had the long hair popular in the 1970’s but considered out of fashion in 1980. His ill-fitted suit seemed too tight around the collar, and I thought he looked like a boy getting ready for his First Communion.

Choose pictures that fully capture Alex’s essence, he said, looking at me, under pressure to return to the kitchen where someone had dropped a tray of sandwiches, creating a commotion only he could fix.

Obviously, the man had never met you. I remember thinking how curious that expression was, To capture the essence. Can anything at all ever capture a man’s essence? Is this even possible? Even the clearest picture represents nothing more than a millisecond of a person’s life. It can never capture the soul or tell us about the internal struggles, the dreams and aspirations, the fears that keep us up at night, and the small victories and humiliating failures that define our lives.

I didn’t argue with the man because I soon realized that he and I had something in common. I too was so eager to please that I would have done almost anything he asked me to do. And, like him, I showed a deference for the wealthy and powerful that I seldom showed people whom I considered my equals. This was not a conscious effort on my part, but rather, an unspoken rule I had internalized as I grew up. In our society, the wealthy were often honored with titles like Don or Doctor even if they had no formal education. They were treated with the respect and fear often shown only to the clergy. As a result, most wealthy people expected preferential treatment, blind obedience, and unquestioned respect.

I chose several pictures that showed you in a favorable light. I had no other choice. None of the pictures showed your obsessive preoccupation with death, your irreverent sense of humor, the depth of your faith, your love for the outcast and the underdog, your beautiful baritone voice, your annoying tendency to pick your teeth in public after every meal, the grandiose gestures you used to show someone your love, your almost pathological passion for all things dangerous, or your tendency to chew with your mouth open and to talk with a mouth full of food. No picture showed your mood swings, the incredible heights and terrifying lows. And no picture could ever show the impact you had on everyone who ever met you.

In this family we look our best or die trying.

Your mother introduced me to a group of your friends. Carlos, one of the boys, was your cousin. He had traveled with his family from Miami for the funeral. I was told later that the two of you had been very close until his family immigrated to the United States when Carlos was three years old. The family had kept a beautiful house in the city and a large plantation in Rio Negro, a prominent area of the state. Carlos had not seen you since he was five years old. The family used to vacation in Europe and had not returned to Medellin in many years.

This was understandable. In the late 1970’s the wealthy in Colombia had reasons to be cautious. Kidnappings had become a popular way for street delinquents and organized groups to fund their criminal enterprises; small businesses were often shaken down for protection money; and the police and military demanded their own pound of flesh in the form of bribes. In fact, the only difference between the military and the cartels was the fact that the military wore uniforms and committed their crimes in the daytime. In any case, your cousin barely remembered you and seemed out of place, although it was obvious that his family was well respected and admired by those in attendance.

Two of the boys were your friends from the Anglo-American school you attended in the city. The American School, as it was popularly known, was an exclusive complex of impressive buildings, sports facilities, and the latest in modern technology. On par with most American boarding schools, the school provided bilingual residential and day school programs for the children of diplomats and the Colombian elite. Since you lived in the neighborhood, you had attended the day school since kindergarten. In fact, John, one of the boys I met that day, had become your friend from your first day of school. He was almost as short as I was at five feet six inches, a whole inch taller than I. He had a nervous energy about him that was quite unsettling. Unable to pay attention for more than a few minutes at a time, John drifted in and out of conversations, often leaving the speaker in mid-sentence. At first, I thought he had a mental disorder, but later I learned that John was high for twelve to fifteen hours a day. The rest of the time he was religiously dedicated to sleep.

Michael, the other school friend, was sixteen years old and the son of an American diplomat on assignment in Medellin. I never asked what type of diplomat he was because we had more blond and blue-eyed teachers, vendors, and low-level diplomats in Medellin in the 1980’s than at any other time in history. Some of us at school would often laugh and suggest that the American Central Intelligence Agency needed to hire a more diverse work force. After all, if you are going to infiltrate a Latin American nation, the least you could do was to send us people who looked like us.

The fourth boy was your neighbor and best friend, Cesar, and his name is the only one I didn’t have to force myself to remember when I started writing this story. His role in the events that unfolded after your death has haunted me since your funeral and, I suspect, it will continue to affect me for many years to come.

Chapter Two

Gathering the five of us, your mother had introduced me, saying, This is Joe. Then, as if responding to their inquisitive looks, she added, He was Alex’s best friend at camp.

She paused for a second, fighting a new wave of tears. He was the last person to speak to Alex before he... Unable to finish the sentence, she broke down in uncontrollable sobs.

Your father ran to her side and enveloped her in a bear hug, quickly taking her to an adjoining private room. Before leaving us, your father turned and looked straight at me, with a mixture of anger and pain. He held his gaze for a few chilling seconds. I had never met him before, but his imposing figure, his impeccable and expensive suit, and the few strands of gray hair on his temples gave him an air of sophistication. He looked like a man used to being in charge. The fierceness of his look was threatening and unsettling. He seemed to be trying to pierce into my soul to see what laid there.

He knows, I remember thinking. My dad doesn’t know shit, you had told me on that fateful last call. But, facing him this way, I wasn’t so sure.

Your friends introduced themselves and I quickly forgot their names, but I still remember the contrast between them and me. They were upper class Envigado boys with prominent last names, a private education, and the delicate mannerisms of the wealthy. They had French tutors, maids, chauffeurs, and wore the latest and most fashionable clothes. They vacationed in San Andres Islands, Bahamas, and Miami. I, on the other hand, was as ordinary and low middle class as it was possible to be back then.

Contrary to most Latin American countries, where there are just two social classes, the poor and the rich, Colombia had always had a middle class. My family owned a working farm in Alta Vista, a small mountain town approximately one-hundred and twenty miles north of Medellin. They also had a home in Bello, a working-class suburb outside of the city, known for being the home of Marco Fidel Suarez (1855-1921), a once illustrious president of the republic. I attended an affordable parochial school, worked most afternoons selling popcorn at a local park, and never vacationed outside of the farm.

Cesar, your neighbor, approached me as the rest of the boys dispersed. He wanted to know about our last conversation.

How did he sound? He asked.

What a stupid question, I remember thinking, but I said nothing.

It was obvious that, although we were all upset, Cesar’s anguish and grief bordered on despair. He looked like he had not slept in days, surviving on strong, black coffee and cigarettes. We all smoked back then. Marlboro lights were the preferred brand, but I smoked Salems. Remember those? They smelled like Vapor Rub and tasted like shit, but I had heard somewhere that smoking menthols was recommended by American doctors for people with asthma. The way I looked at it, If menthols help prevent asthma, they must be good for you. Years later, I learned that no cigarette was good for you and tobacco leads to cancer and death.

What do you mean? I asked Cesar, a bit defensively.

There was an intensity in his voice that made me very uncomfortable. I also didn’t know him well enough to trust him. Not surprisingly, you had never mentioned him in any of our conversations, in the same way that you never mentioned my name to any of your other friends. I could have been upset by this had I not known you as well as I did. You had a remarkable ability to compartmentalize and inhabit different worlds without letting your life in one world affect or interfere with your life in another. I belonged to a world light years away from your school and your town. There was something about Cesar that I couldn’t put my finger on. All sorts of red flags were warning me to exercise caution around him.

"In this family, we eat our young..." I had a suspicion that by the time your funeral was over, I would know exactly what your saying meant.

Was he upset? Did he say anything about me? he insisted. There was something odd about the way Cesar asked the second question, Did he say anything about me?

I could see there was guilt in his eyes, as though he felt personally responsible for your death. Before I had an opportunity to answer, he lowered his head and started crying. He had an almost refined way of crying - quiet, soft, dignified. I observed him quietly for a few seconds and noticed for the first time how handsome he was. He was approximately six feet tall and had clear blue eyes. His facial features, blond hair, and bone structure made him look like a well-bred Castilian prince. Thinking about him now, I could compare him to a blond Dorian Gray, the iconic character of Oscar Wilde’s famous novel. If it weren’t because of his very distinctive local accent, one could almost think that Cesar was a Northern European ex-pat living in Medellin.

The next day, I learned that Cesar had an American father and a very prominent Colombian mother. An only son and heir apparent of a vast fortune, the boy had been educated in London until the age of nine, when his father relocated his fashion business to his wife’s native city in search of cheaper labor and better weather. During the five years the business had operated in Medellin, the business had grown to include several high-end clothing stores, a factory which manufactured high fashion garments for various renown American designers, and several commercial and residential real estate buildings.

He was happy, or at least he sounded happy, I answered evasively.

Cesar looked at me intently, trying hard to decide if he could trust me. Unsatisfied with my answer, he pressed on, What did he say about me? He asked a second time, enunciating each word slowly, with a pronounced emphasis on the word me.

I ignored his attempt at intimidation and answered him, He was the same Alex we know. We talked about camp, his plans for the rest of vacation... You know, stuff like that. He didn’t mention you at all.

Cesar seemed satisfied with that answer, but, suddenly, he remembered those episodes from Sesame Street about things not belonging to sets. He asked, Who are you again? And how did you meet Alex?

The subtext of the questions was obvious. In a sea of mourners at the wake, I was the only one who didn’t seem to belong. Nobody knew who I was, and nobody believed that I was just a camp friend. There was no universe they could imagine where you would have befriended a short, bespectacled, emaciated, working-class boy from the wrong side of the city. All your friends had a common background. They belonged to a social class filled with unspoken rules and controlled by norms no one had to write in a secret manual because they all knew them instinctively and adhered to them at all costs.

Life was lived within circles. A person was born within the small circle of a particular family and town; lived his life around the same people, streets, schools, and institutions; dated locally and within his class; and married, had children and settled in the same general area where he grew up, continuing the pattern begun by his ancestors generations before. And, even when movement was possible from one town or city to another, most people settled in the same areas where members of the extended family lived.

Education or wealth made it possible for some to advance to wider circles. It was often possible for a well-educated person to marry above his social class. It was also possible for what Americans call New Money to be welcomed into circles formerly reserved for the aristocracy. In families like yours and Cesar’s, however, the boundaries were reinforced strictly. Those within the circle had the freedom of movement reserved for the upper classes. Those outside of the circle had little to no chance to get in. This is just the way life was, and no one made too much of it because there was nothing we could do about it.

It was difficult for me to imagine your friendship with Cesar or with any of the other friends I met that night. You were so carefree, so willing to buck social conventions, so comfortable around peasants and pissants like me. Perhaps the real problem was understanding how you could have chosen someone like me to be your friend and confidant. What was it that you used to say? I think the expression involved a blind man and a monkey. I love you like a blind man loves his monkey. That’s it. I never understood the phrase, but I never tried to understand much of what you said anyway. Sometimes you spoke in riddles, and that was